Seekers
by Tolaya
Summary: AU;Deception is in their name. The decepticons has protected their most valued individual behind lies through thousands of vorns, is the secret now to be unveiled? Or do the cover managed to hold? Starscream finds himself in a bad situation. and what is with Thundercracker and Skywarp? is their friendship going to end when unknown seeker habits reveal themselves?
1. Chapter 1

Another story that i have had worked on for some months, but currently are a bit dormant, since i work on On Seeker Habits right now. But it is not forgotten. i Hope you like.

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"Frag" was all Sideswipe could say as he drove down the road; for once he was alone, not followed or following Sunstreaker. The twins had had a rather fierce argument ending in the usual brawl, and Prowl had seen it wise to separate them for the time being, why Sideswipe now currently was patrolling the outskirts of Denver.

He wasn't used to the silence; the two frontliners had always been together and being apart from the other was hard on both of them. No one understood that when they separated the two, which would have been wise enough, if it had been anyone else and not the twins everything just got worse. The need to release accumulated energy that Sideswipe felt and the aggressions Sunstreaker carried with him as a blanket just intensified, until the next inevitable brawl between them.

::Sunny?:: once more he tried to get an answer out of the golden twin who was still back at the base, but after some minutes he sighed in defeat, Sunstreaker wasn't going to help him in his loneliness. He could sense that his twin didn't fare better than him in being alone, and the times their superiors had deemed it fit to separate them, Sunstreaker had responded with withdrawal.

Hitting the highway he revved his engine and reached fairly above the allowed 90 mph; if he couldn't taunt Sunstreaker into a brawl and get release that way, he had to feel the exhilarating feel of the winds blow against his windshield. Zigzagging between the slow moving cars of the few humans still out on the roads; it was late evening and most of the humans were home with their family, he left Denver at a steady pace, not once slowing his speed.

"Fragging fraggers" he once more cursed. Darkness enveloped him as the last cars vanished from sight, the unlit highway the only one to listen to his words as he continued his straight path into nothingness.

Sunstreaker had closed himself inside the twins' quarters, avoiding everyone in his brothers absent. Even Bluestreak, one both twins were highly protective about had not been allowed inside. He could tell the rest of the autobots that Sunstreaker at least had shared a few comments with him, and that the golden twin currently had turned to his paintings.

Sunstreaker could sense Sideswipes boredom and loneliness, but even if he had chosen to answer the prodding Sideswipe had done an hour before, he knew that it wouldn't have been enough contact for either of them. Yes their bond was a gift, but sometimes it was a curse as well, the urgent need to be close to the other when apart was one of those. In the heat of battle of course it was a blessing; they could interpret each other's intentions and soundlessly communicate through the large noise of the battle.

Returning to the painting currently placed at the easel showing a sketch of Starscream, he studied the seekers features; his antics at the day's raid when the twins had grounded his trinemates had been fascinating. Sunstreaker could only describe it as an angel of death, ready to avenge the two seekers lying in a scrap heap at their pedes; it had prompted him to do the sketch first thing at their return to base. He wasn't quite satisfied with the look in the optics; the fiery hue they had attained in their usual red color had promised a slowly painful death and that particular color was what he was working on right now. It sort of calmed the golden frontliner when he turned to his paintings, his dedication to the art closing out the surroundings so that only the painting existed.

"I can't believe you two." The words were spoken in the medical bay of the Decepticon headquarters, the Nemesis lying dormant beneath the waters of the Atlantic Ocean.

Once again the CMO scanned the mechs before him, both sheepishly looking down; they knew that they were in for a lesson. He had spent at least a few hours of patching their sorry afts together after the forces returned from a disastrous raid, and now they were here again, both showing wounds all over their frames once more.

He was almost tempted to send them back to their quarters, leaving it to their self-repair to deal with it, hopeful that it would be them a lesson to not waste his precious time fixing them by later scrap it all in what, a brawl?

Shaking his helm in the human gesture of disdain he ordered them on the med berths, soldering tool already unsubspaced. They were after all high-ranking officers and it would be bad to show the troops that their leading officers could be as unruly as themselves.

"Where are those fraggers when you need them?!" Sideswipe was bored; his patrol had not showed any decepticons at all, and the absence of their enemies was grating on him, he needed the rush.

The fight earlier that day had been too short for his liking. He and Sunny had managed to perform their jetjudo, efficiently taking Thundercracker and Skywarp out of the air, the two seekers retreating with the rest of the decepticons carried by Starscream and some of the constructicons. Starscream had looked ready to blow a gasket as he had watched his trinemates being forced into the ground by the twins, the tearing of metal screeching enough to grate on everyone's audios.

"That'll teach them not to mess with us" he laughed as he once more recalled the event. That was one of the things he and his brother loved the most, to put those jets in their place. Unfortunately they rarely got the chance to ground Starscream, the Deception Air Commander and SIC more aware and careful than his trinemates, and when they did try and managed to get on his back, Megatron or one of the other jets tended to interfere annoyingly in their game.

Scanning the scenery around him, not detecting any decepticon signals he continued to the next spot on his route.

As Starscream watched a job well done once more, Thundercracker and Skywarp enjoyed the absent feeling of pain from their wounds. Yes the soldering had been painful, but they were decepticons and not weak autobots in need of anesthetics during repair.

"So, are you going to tell me WHY you had to show up like that in my med bay, only a few hours after I released you both from repairs, AND told you to relax?" Starscream asked tired. It was unlike his trinemates to turn to physical arguments; they were as close friends as decepticons could be with their disdain for tight relationships. Of course no one told anything to their faceplates unless they had a death wish.

So of course their antics as they had entered the med bay made the CMO curious as to what had happened. Thundercracker as the Air Commander and Skywarp as their SIC was both intelligent and skilled enough in their interaction in the decepticon army to save the aggressions for the enemy, but something must have ticked one or both off for them to go at each other as they clearly had.

"Sparklings" he muttered to himself as Thundercracker faced him, unease clear in the optics. He ground one of his pedes in the ground like a scolded child, aware of the fault he had done, almost mirroring Skywarp beside him.

"Well?" he asked when it was clear none of them wanted to be the one to answer the question.

"Ya know Screamer, it just happened. S'not like I can tell you what ticked us off particularly. I was just joking about the raid today, and me being carried by you. You are so much more careful to watch our wounds and not hurt us more than needed than those cursed 'structies." Skywarp told, once more scuffing his pede in the ground, embarrassment clear in his vocalizer.

"Primus gives me strength" he deadpanned "Why am I stuck with you two! Sometimes you actually act like you have a processor but most of the time I simply don't understand you" a long suffering sound left Starscreams vocalizer as he said that, once again shaking his helm, this time in disbelief.

He turned to clean up the tools used to patch his trinemates back together "I don't want to see any of you in here in the nearest future. Now scram, I got work to do!"

Sulking Thundercracker left for the door, Skywarp one last pitiful glance at Starscream soon followed, they weren't used to his gruffness. Both hoped his mood would ease a bit before their recharge cycle, or he even might exclude them from their usual snuggling, yeah the command trine of the decepticons snuggled while recharging, after all no one watched them in their private quarters.

On the way to their quarters Skywarp studied Thundercracker, and after some time he held out a servo, halting their further advance and leant against the wall.

"You were right. I'm relieved that we decided to not tell him that this wasn't the first time we have had a fight. Imagine what fit he would have ended in if we had. I just still wonder why we are having these fights at all" a thoughtful demeanor on his facial plate.

"Who knows? Come on let's not have this conversation out here, better wait until we are in privacy." Thundercracker turned and began to walk once again.

Entering their quarters, Skywarp walked to his berth and sat down, wings resting against the wall, while Thundercracker went to the monitor placing himself in the console's chair and relaxed, his newly wielded wounds aching a bit. Pitching his nasal bridge he recalled the day as it had turned out, completely disastrous.

The only good that had happened since he roused from recharge that morning had been the feel of Skywarp at his back and Starscream at his front before he had left their shared berth. And then the raid; those pit spawned Autobot twins had got them good, one second he had had the Autobot SIC targeted for a missile barrage the next he had ten tons of not evenly placed autobot to carry, trying his best not to crash and get rid of the overweight.

Their primus damned jetjudo. He let out a menacing growl. And then as Starscream had sought them out at their crash site the autobots had had the audacity to try and take him out of the sky too. He knew some of it was due to the propaganda showing Starscream as Decepticon SIC and Air Commander, making a target of the red flier, but it was safer than the autobots knowing the true command structure, and Starscreams real role; still it made him furious. Hook already was a major target among them, and if the knowledge of Starscream being the actual CMO was revealed and the only one Megatron would allow treating him, he could face true danger.

Megatron had countless times argued with the flier to not be in the frontline, but every time Starscream had managed to quiet the warlord. He after all was the trineleader in the command trine, and that role was necessary to fulfill, especially during fights, so Starscream continued leading them into the fights, leaving the actual strategy to Thundercracker and Skywarp while he watched the battleground, supporting where he could and tried to stay out of too much trouble. This act had played in their favor so far, his actions seen as cowardice and not what they actually were.

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	2. Chapter 2

And then another chapter. :)

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Starscream watched the leaving fliers over one of his shoulder vents. "Stupidity" he hissed, if his trinemates thought that they could trick him, their CMO to think this was first time they truly were naïve. Of course he would notice their poor patch ups; they may have been trained in field repair, but nothing they could perform with their untrained servos would go unnoticed by a true medic.

"Why do I keep accepting their childlike behavior?" he sighed. He had noticed the patch ups some few months ago, at first just frowning. But when he continued to find traces of their uneven soldering on their frames he became more and more mystified; nothing in privacy when he were there had changed among them, so why did he keep finding new spots recently soldered, and not by Hook or his own servos?

Today had been different he mused. They had really done each other good, deep gashes had snaked their way through both their frames, ending here and there, showing signs of a fight where no one had held back his power, and still he had watched them supporting each other as they walk through the door to the med bay; it would have been a comical sight, if not for his wasted patch up few hours earlier. No wonder he was angry.

Leaving the med bay to Hook, his work with the patients and the cleaning of the equipment done, Starscream stretched his backstrut before exiting the doors. Out in the corridor he felt cramped now that his work with the injured no longer distracted him from his returning need to fly. This was one of the reasons why he kept make his statements regarding joining the forces in battle, his excuse for leaving the sunken spaceship, the underwater environment claustrophobic to any flier. Hook and the rest of the constructicons, being land based handled the fate of being resigned to stay on the Nemesis, and not join the raids unless their skills were needed far better, and while they didn't join the raids much they still got out at those times, but Starscream mainly as a medic and scientist would be leaving their base far less than the builders.

A quick decision made him turn in the direction of the exit, and not their quarters, he needed to feel the air under his wings, and he especially needed to vent his frustrations regarding his trinemates. He had no clue concerning their unusual acting up, and he felt dread for the future, sensing that these events that seemed to happen more and more often, increased in intensity as time went by. He hoped the feeling of wide expanses and air surrounding him would ease his CPU, making his processor work more fluid, hopeful that he might come to a solution or even just a reason to their behavior.

Sideswipe had to check is locator twice as the blip occurred; he was at his fifth patrolling spot, and as he had studied his surroundings with boredom the sound had startled him as he had already resigned to the obviously dull patrol, not expecting any reaction from the equipment.

"Yes" the frontliner jubilated as the blip once again occurred, this time closer. Raising his optics to the dark faintly clouded sky he tried to locate the source, shifting to infrared.

The decepticon was flying in a straight line, at a relaxed pace, making it unclear whether it was one of the seekers or land based decepticons.

As he got the warmth signature in his vision he could make out the outline of a plane, "So a seeker" he mused, wondering what one of those was doing alone as he contacted autobot base.

"Report Sideswipe" the stern voice of Prowl greeted him.

"Decepticon sighting at sector 5 alpha; one lone dot, seeker." He dutifully replied.

"Acknowledged, direction?" Prowl asked.

"It is headed west north west, at a steady pace, flying in a straight line."

"Not any identifications Sideswipe?" Optimus' voice joined.

"Sorry Sir, flying to high."

"Good work soldier. Follow and report in case anything happens. I wouldn't suspect Megatron to have cooked up a new plan this fast, but it can never hurt to keep optics on any strange behavior."

"He definitely doesn't follow their usual patrolling pattern." Prowl agreed.

Sideswipe closed his Com-Link, transformed and revved his engines; the hunt was on. Had he been in root mode you would have noticed his predatory smile. The seeker was sure in for a beating if he came close enough.

Back at the Nemesis Starscreams trinemates wondered where he was. He had yet to return to their quarters, and their recharge cycle was soon to begin. Frowning Thundercracker Com'ed the med bay; their trineleader might have been caught up in his duties which wasn't first time such would occur. But he was disappointed as he was greeted by Hooks uncaring voice.

"Yes he has left, he did so a dozen or so minutes ago, and no I don't know where he went if he isn't with you. Now if you please, I'm busy." Hook gruffly answered the unspoken questions and then closed the Com without any further hesitation.

Back at the shared quarters of the command trine Thundercracker shared a look with Skywarp, the purple flier sending him a concerned look.

"Think he still is mad at us? Punishing us?" Skywarp asked anxiety clear in his vocalizer.

At times like this it reminded Thundercracker that the three of them, despite being commanding officers still were fairly young. Before their landfall on Earth and their million years long stasis they had almost just entered mechhood when they joined the war, fresh out of the War academy. In Starscreams case it had been the Science academy, after he had been deemed more useful in the art of science and knowledge than the art of warfare. He had spent some time at the War academy before his transfer, and they had come to know each other quite well, the transfer not making it any different to Thundercracker or Skywarp, even if their mentors wanted them to pick another member for their trine.

"He'll come around, don't worry 'Warp." He reassured.

"Hope so, and soon; don't like him mad, he always yell and preach. We just need him to start throw stuff at us like I have heard the autobot CMO do." The purple seeker grimaced.

Starscream was unaware of the predicament he soon would find himself in as he continued his straight line of flying, caught up in thoughts, not aware of his surroundings and his stalker on the ground.

As his HUD told him that he was low on fuel his attention finally changed and he became aware of the distance he had traveled while he had been caught in his deep thoughts. He banked and made for a U turn facing the direction back to base as a signal he had been unaware of blipped in one of his indicators; the autobot signal clear as day.

"Slag, how did I miss this brat?" he cursed, attempting to identify the signal.

"Oh no" he hissed, followed by more cursing as the identification of the culprit came back, showing the decepticon CMO that his stalker was none else than the red jetjudo twin, the complications obvious to his processor.

The warning in his HUD became slowly higher and more irritating; he KNEW already that he was low. Fear rushed his mind as the fuel indicator reach the critical red field and he realized that he wouldn't make it back to the base. Scolding himself for the mistake of not refueling before takeoff and then losing contact with reality as he flew he tried to find a suitable hiding spot, the plain field beneath him unfortunately not giving much cover. The occasional blip alerted him that he still got the autobot on his tail as he scanned the ground below frantically looking for any place to hide.

It never occurred to Starscream to just face the frontliner, the autobot was a powerful warrior, and he himself was only equipped with his own null rays; non-lethal weapons that would only just stun the warrior thus only giving him a short respite. They were useful during battle where he could incapacitate the enemies coming at him, leaving the stunned bots to the rest of the decepticons. On his own he was best off in the air, out of their range of fire, but as his HUD told him, he would crash land within ten minutes if he stayed airborne, so that strategy was useless.

Sideswipe watched the seeker return the direction it had come from increasing its speed drastically, the loud boom signaling the entry of supersonic speed only to a few minutes later slow down, almost wobbling in the air as it descended coming in for a landing in the far distance.

Curious he revved his engines and headed in the direction, briefly contemplating contacting the base, the behavior was strange definitely, but he still didn't know what he would have to deal with when he reached the landing spot, crash site?

As he closed in on the decepticon he noticed that so far there was no sign of smoke or fire in the area, so this was definitely not a crash site, which made him wonder what could cause a seeker to land; the proud seekers despised being on the ground and only left the sky under dire circumstances.

Before his optics he saw a small gathering of trees shielding the seeker from sight, making it hard to identify the identity by optical vision, but as he assessed his systems he got the positive feedback: Starscream.

'Oh my, this is my lucky day' he thought as he watched the seeker touch a digit to his helm, optics flashing briefly, the telltale of a comm. communication.

Aware of his own duties he forwarded his own comm. to the base.

"Sideswipe to base" he reported.

"Prowl here, report." the stern voice of the SIC returned

"Confirmation, seeker identity Starscream, location, grounded sector 5 beta." Sides' responded.

"Grounded?" the incredulous voice of Optimus asked bemusement clear in his vocalizer.

"Yes Sir. Slagger landed at a gathering of trees, currently communicating through comm., orders?"

"Standby, I'm sending your brother and Ironhide to your location, this opportunity is too good to waste" Prowl replied. They rarely got the decepticon SIC this vulnerable; he was always followed by his trine close by.

"Understood" with a salute he closed the comm. returning his attention to the still grounded seeker less than hundred feet away.

Grumbling Starscream paced; the trees were not nearly enough to shield him completely from sight, but it had been the only cover in miles. He had comm. Thundercracker, embarrassed that he had to unveil his failure, but he knew when to ask for help. He was vulnerable out here, unable to stay safe in the air. The knowledge that he couldn't get airborne was enough to rattle his processor, and even though he was out in the open he felt the fear of being grounded and the creeping claustrophobia.

Thundercracker had scolded him for taking off alone, not telling anything to anyone, but at the same time Starscream had sensed relief in the others tone as he organized with Skywarp to go gather their trineleader.

"We will be there in twenty minutes. Hide and stay low until then, we will hurry" Thundercracker had reassured him, before closing the comm.

Unfortunately the Autobots wouldn't make the retrieval of their lost trinemate easy, as Starscream was unaware of the three sets of optics studying him from a distance.

Sunstreaker and Ironhide had just arrived at the location a few minutes before, and watched the seeker pace under the trees.

:: Too bad he aren't airborne, would be fun to teach him a judo lesson. Not often we get a chance to show his holiness our thing personally:: an evil smirk on Sunstreakers faceplate.

::True.:: Sides' calmly responded, disappointed that he hadn't had a chance at the seeker himself.

"You two scraplets ready?" the gruff voice of Ironhide asked beside them, not happy having to work this around with the twins.

Optics shinning with mischief was all he got in response, the faces of the twins twisted in big smiles. Oh they were more than ready.

Starscream didn't know what hit him before he found himself sprawled on the ground, weight on his chassis pinning him to the ground.

A shriek of outrage left his vocalizer as he fought to remove the weight, not able to see what was pinning him. The object however didn't budge and the more he trashed to get up the more scrapped his wings got. Finally, when Ironhide had had enough he powered his cannon, efficiently quieting the trashing.

Starscream stilled completely at the sound, well aware of the owner of this particular weapon. He had patched enough mechs together to know the damage done by those cannons; Ironhide was a perfect shooter, and the weapons specialist wasn't known for his mercy in battle.

"Keep still 'con!" Ironhide snarled at the prone frame covered by red and yellow autobot.

"Yeah wouldn't want to damage those pretty wings more than necessary." Sideswipe teased, firmly keeping the lower part of the seeker prone to the ground.

"I hear they are one of the most sensitive parts of a seeker" Sunstreaker voiced, letting a digit trail the rim of the left wing as he said it. An evil laughter escaping his vocalizer as Starscreams wing began trembling under the ministration.

Guilt flooded his mind as the last thought filling his processor before he entered a forced stasis was of his trinemates and what they would do when they arrived and he wouldn't be there. Then all went black.

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Please review.:)


	3. Chapter 3

And a thrid chapter. that will be all, so far, until i get time to look at this when i find the time. but i hope you like, and reviews might make me return to it faster:)

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Skywarp had been ecstatic when Thundercracker had told him why Starscream weren't with them, the black and purple seeker relieved that the reason wasn't because their trineleader was mad at them. It had taken the stoic seeker a few minutes to calm the teleporter enough to be able to teleport them above the surface of the ocean.

Now en route to the location Starscream had relayed to them Thundercracker pushed his engines to their highest, Starscream was in dire need of help and in enemy territory, even worse he was followed. Hopefully they would make it before Starscream got caught by the 'bots. It would be risky to let him into enemy hands, and the CMO wasn't used to being captured. This would be the first time ever that would happen, and of course the autobots would use the chance to take him prisoner.

The thought of Starscream behind bars made his spark burn with unrestrained anger, the reaction strong in the normally calm and collected tactician. It fuelled his engines further and as they neared the location only ten minutes had passed.

He activated his scanner and tried to reach his trinemate through their comm. but got no answer beyond static. The scanner not showing any signs either.

Beside him Skywarp faltered a bit in his flight, his unease clearly stating that he too had tried to communicate with their missing trineleader to no avail.

"Where is he?!" the purple and black seeker inquired.

"I don't know 'Warp, stay in the air for now." Cursing Thundercracker landed a bit from the trees Starscream had mentioned, warily nearing them in case there would be a trap.

As he came closer to the trees his fuel tanks churned as he saw that the ground was littered with red and white flecks and the ground was a mess, showing signs of light struggle.

He knew the answer to Skywarps question – their trineleader, CMO and closest friend was in the hands of the enemy. He just hoped Starscream would pull through whatever the 'bots had in store for him.

Alerting Megatron of the situation he ordered Skywarp to return back to base as he himself took to the air and scouted the area before returning back to the base himself.

Starscream awoke with a groan; a forced stasis was never a pleasurable experience and the reboot made his systems sluggish coming online one at a time.

The first indication of his whereabouts was the ugly orange color surrounding him, the main coloration of the autobot base and he was reminded of the dire situation he found himself in.

Running a diagnostics he found his systems running normally, no glitch from the stasis was a lucky one, and the few bad codes that could occurred would be dealt with during his next recharge. That thought reminded him that he was in need of the downtime, his shift and later frustrations regarding his trinemates had kept him going and let him forget his depleted energy reserves which now came back full force.

Noting the few anomalies; his nullrays absence and the offline weapons systems, together with his communications he shrugged, it wasn't like the weapons would be of any use to him anyway and he knew that Thundercracker would know from his absence at the location he had provided them with that he now was a prisoner, he pulled himself into a comfortable position and initiated his recharge cycle. Sustaining his energy was priority number one and it wasn't like he could do anything else before his captors showed up.

The twins had returned to their quarters, satisfied with a task well done. It wasn't often that they got a chance to capture a seeker, and this one being Starscream was a first.

Sunstreaker had loved the chance to get so close to one while not in a fight, able to really study and feel the plating. While in a battle their focus was so much on besting the jets and avoid getting thrown off that he rarely got a chance to relish in the feel of the jets' plating, and as he had helped Sideswipe load Starscream into Ironhide he had for the first time noticed how warm the wings of the seeker were, almost burning hot to the touch. It made him wonder what differences there were between grounders and fliers beside the obvious visible designs.

As Sunstreaker reveled in the experience Sideswipe just enjoyed being close with his brother once more, Prowl had been generous and allowed him to stay at the base and not continue his punishment as the patrol had been. Currently he lay on his berth silently watching Sunstreaker fiddle with a pad in his hands, optics distant. He knew of his brothers infatuation of the seekers, and wasn't cruel enough to pull the other out of his dreaming just yet; it wasn't often that Sunstreaker mellowed, but it seemed something about the seeker tonight had done something to the always offensive mech.

Optimus was currently in a meeting with his officers discussing the events regarding their capture of the decepticon SIC, the ordeal big enough to cause smiles form on the stoic Prowl, while Jazz silently was celebrating their victory.

Returning to the present he turned his attention back to his CMO Ratchet who had had the opportunity to examine the seeker updating their files of the enemy and the seekers fully.

"It is confirmed Prime. The command trine is young; so far I had only had the chance to study Thundercracker and Skywarp up close, since we have had our hands on those two a few times during our skirmishes, with Starscream here I can conclude that they are of almost same age." The CMO was certainly pleased that was obvious, able to complete a full study of the command trine had been a project of his for a long time.

"My guess is that they only had had a few thousand vorns of mechhood before entering the war. I have recorded some oddities to their frames, but those being seekers could have some to do with it, I still don't have enough knowledge of the subspecies that the seekers are."

"What stand out the most is that some of their systems are still not fully developed which might rely on their young age. What interests me is that Starscream has no sign of a codpiece visibly, but scans shows that his interface array is under development. From my knowledge of Thundercracker and Skywarp they the last time we had our hands on them had both developed this. My knowledge of seekers is slim, and I guess that their coding is much more complex than ours, my override codes didn't even activate the opening of their codpieces as it should have." The last sentence left the medic in a more grouchy tone than the rest, and it was clearly that the medic didn't like not to know everything about mechs in his care.

"I don't see what relevance this has to us Ratchet." Ironhide said, not understanding all the fuss the medic vented.

"Not much right now, but it might come in handy later." Was the huffed response from the medic across the table.

Optimus watched their discussion with interest, he knew that his CMO was obsessed by medical knowledge and took the chance to explore when the opportunity came.

"Any further information you need to show Ratchet? Or can I let Prowl take over from now?" Optimus cut their discussion.

"No Prime. Carry on." The medic relaxed in his seat accepting that now was not the time for further discussion on the difference between ground and flier models.

"Good. Prowl what is your plan so far? Think we can gain any information from him?" They didn't know how Starscream would react since this was a first time to have him in their possession.

"My guess is that he might be in possession of useful information, but how easy he is broken and how likely it is for Megatron to be willing to negotiate is unsure." Prowl voiced, he had had his musings as soon as they had send Sunstreaker and Ironhide to assist Sideswipe in taking the seeker prisoner. He had deemed the benefit in leaving Megatron without his SIC enough to act, but the fact that they possibly could get information out of the flier was what would be the biggest gain in the action.

And in the case that they weren't able to get any information out of the seeker the negotiations with the decepticon warlord to get his SIC back might prove useful. The decepticons to Prowls knowledge did not have any autobot prisoners currently and thus they would be able to demand other actions as payment to let the SIC get back to his faction. Of course if the SIC was worth anything to the warlord at all. Prowl had no illusions of the goodness in the decepticon army where it was everyone for themselves and Starscream might just be a sacrifice willingly made.

"Very well mechs. We will submit Starscream to interrogation 0800 in the morning. Let's call it for now. Go get some recharge everyone." Optimus announced as it seemed there were no more to discuss.

While the autobots disbanded to their shifts or to recharge if they were off shift the situation on the Nemesis was a different one.

Thundercracker had made it back to base half an hour after Skywarp and had sought out Megatron, who unsurprisingly had been in the command center occupied in livid discussion with Soundwave.

Announcing his return as he entered, Thundercracker strode to the throne in the middle of the room. As he reached the discussing mechs he listened to the two arguing whether to wait for or act before the autobots contacted them. After all it wouldn't do to let their enemies know that they had in their possession one of the most delicate members of the whole Decepticon army. Hook was a decent medic, but Starscream handled the more severe cases of injury among their soldiers, and had advanced study of sparks and processors, something even Ratchet as educated as he was didn't have any knowledge of.

To Thundercracker the missing trinemate meant a lot. He still couldn't get anything from Starscream, which meant he must still be in some sort of stasis. It put the two thirds left at the nemesis off, not at all used to being separated like this, and never from their Star. It was obvious that the warlord was concerned about his CMO since the seeker even weren't admonished by his rude intrusion of the argument, something he usually didn't show, preferring to yell and curse the red flier.

"Report!" Megatron ordered the seeker, his optics ablaze in fury.

"No more signs found at the location, the only sign the flecks of paint at the spot. Thankfully no signs of severe injury since there weren't any energon spilt." Thundercracker said voice carrying a faint relief at the fact that it seemed Starscream had been subdued quite calmly.

Megatron growled not at all liking that his CMO was caught and in the hands of the enemy. The medic wasn't geared to handling this kind of situations. Inwardly he scolded himself for not thinking of preparing the red flier just I case something like this occurred.

Returning to Thundercracker he dismissed the seeker for now. The Air commander would be of use for battle strategy in case they decided to take the fight to the autobots before entering any kind of negotiations. For now he would need his SIC to help plan and decide what course of action to take.

Sending a Comm. to the black and purple flier he summoned Skywarp to the command center just as Thundercracker turn on his heels.

As the blue seeker left, Skywarp announced his presence with a pop before he emerged from a flashing purple mist. The autobots might think him stupid and more of a prankster, but the black and purple seeker did quite well at his assignment and when shit hit the fan he was a refreshing contribute with unorthodox ways of handling the situations.

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